Kidd completes Darussafaka rally from 23 down!

A tale of two dominant halves added up to a thrilling finish as Darussafaka Istanbul stunned visiting FC Bayern Munich with a 76-74 victory on Tuesday in Game 1 of their best-of-three series. Stanton Kidd's catch-and-shoot three-pointer in the game's final second won it after Darussafaka rallied from a 23-point deficit late in the first half. Bayern had scorched through Darussafaka until then to lead 24-47 before two pre-halftime three-pointers by Kidd and Scottie Wilbekin started Darussafaka's comeback. A 28-16 third quarter got Darussafaka within 58-63 but its first lead waited until 73-72 with 55 seconds left and was lost on Jared Cunningham's layup for Bayern – until Kidd had the final word. Wilbekin led the winners with 24 points and 7 assists. Micheal Eric had a double-double of 18 points, 11 rebounds. And JaJuan Johnson had 15 points before fouling out. The defensive catalyst of Darussafaka's comeback was Dogus Ozdemiroglu who played 19 minutes of the second half with 5 rebounds and 2 steals. Bayern got 20 points from Jared Cunning ham, 15 from Reggie Redding and 12 from Devin Booker but saw its overall production drop from 47 points in the first half to 27 in the second.

Stefan Jovic and Cunningham went aggressively to the basket and Booker fed Danilo Barthel inside as Bayern staked a quick 0-8 advantage. After 4 scoreless minutes, Johnson put Darussafaka on the scoreboard, but Redding bettered him with a three-point play at 2-11. Booker kept it going with 6 straight points, between which Johnson scored again. After Eric became Darussafaka's second scorer, with free throws, Cunningham banked in a triple at 6-20. Maik Zirbes came off the bench for a jumper that Eric answered with a put-back, but Redding dialed up a triple on the buzzer for an incredible 11-25 Bayern lead after 10 minutes. Eric blasted a dunk and scored again to cut the difference to 15-27 before Vladimir Lucic struck from deep for Bayern. Wilbekin hit free throws and Will Cummings drove for a three-point play at 20-30. Braydon Hobbs found Cunningham with a no-look pass and Nihad Dedovic picked the pocket of Howard Sant-Roos for a fastbreak at 20-34. After Booker downed free throws and Lucic scored, Bayern had a new 0-8 run and a 20-38 edge. After a timeout, Wilbekin hit Darussafaka's first triple after 9 misses, but Cunningham matched him and Booker downed a jumper for the first 20-point lead, 23-43. Nedovic and Barthel scored in close before Kidd banked in a triple for the hosts and Wilbekin did the same on the buzzer to cut the difference to 30-47.

Redding's jumper started the second half before Ozdemiroglu's steal led to a three-point play by Johnson, who then hit a triple in transition to suddenly make it 36-49. Wilbekin's runner made it an 8-0 run for Darussafaka, whose defense held Bayern scoreless through 5 minutes 30 seconds until foul shots by Redding. Wilbekin blasted a face-up triple at 41-51 and then Kidd's free throws brought the first single-digit difference in more than two quarters. Redding's next basket was bettered by Johnson from long distance at 46-53. Sant-Roos's first field goal preceded Bayern's first of the third quarter, a back-door dunk by Cunningham at 48-57. Wilbekin hit 5 of 5 free throws to lower the gap to 53-69. Hobbs and Eric traded baskets before Ozdemiroglu returned to bury a triple to make it 58-61. Cunningham's free throws steadied Bayern with a 58-63 lead after 30 minutes. The defenses ruled through 3 minutes of the fourth quarter until Cunningham hit 2 free throws and Eric dunked twice at 62-65. A big triple by Redding made it 64-70 with less than 5 minutes left. Johnson's turnaround got Darussafaka closer, but he was then disqualified with his fifth foul. Eric's put-back of a block made it 69-70 with 2:47 to play. Jovic found Booker for an alley-oop layup that Wilbekin matched with free throws before completing the comeback with a second-chance runner at the start of the final minute for Darussafaka's first lead of the game, 73-72. Cunningham's driving layup was ruled good due to goaltending by Eric for a 73-74 scoreboard with 42 seconds left. A Darussafaka miss was followed by a Bayern turnover with 11 seconds left, giving the home team a chance to win. Darussafaka scrambled before Sant-Roos found Kidd for a catch-and-shoot triple with four-tenths of a second left that pulled out an astounding 76-74 victory from Game 1.

Head Coaches

BLATT, DAVID

Darussafaka Istanbul

"That's pretty special. A lot of it came from the heart of Dogus [Ozdemiroglu] and the heart of Darussafaka. You saw here what a quality team Bayern is. They tried to play the game of us being the favorite. That team has multiple national team players, former EuroLeague players, a former NBA player, experienced, big, strong, tough. And we – intelligently, I think – didn't pay attention to all those games and tried to focus on what was important. We failed in the first half, obviously. We didn't come ready defensively – not from a tactical standpoint, but from a mental standpoint -- and as soon as we put Dogus in the game in the second half, he changed everything in terms of defensive tempo. He improved our pace, got our aggressiveness going, and the rest of the guys responded. So give a lot of credit to that young man."

DJORDJEVIC, SASA

FC Bayern Munich

"Congratulations to Darussafaka. Some games you cannot explain with reasoning or try to find a certain key for what happened in the second half. We prepared well, we were really ready, we played the first half exceptionally good on both ends of the floor, but especially defensively. The players did not enter the third quarter with the right – not attitude, their attitude was ok – but you have to be mean and tough, mean and tough. That was not there. We started the third quarter with three turnovers from our top guys. And Darussafaka got back into single figures in three minutes with no effort, actually. They put all their physicality on the court then. They put some effort in the offensive rebounds, which we controlled in the first half. But in the second half they dominated that and it gave them some second-chance points. It was one ball that decided the game, so each and every mistake is important in a game like this. Like our early three-point shot with some seconds left in the second quarter, which gave them time to release a three-point shot. The last turnover is something that is not our trademark. It is something that I cannot explain. We had experience on the floor. We had our most experienced players at that time, and we expected to finished the game there. We gave them the opportunity to finish the game with a big shot. We put some good defense on for 10 seconds and Kidd made a great shot that he will remember, but it's up to us to win the game on Friday. We'll come back here."

Players

WILBEKIN, SCOTTIE

Darussafaka Istanbul

"It was a great shot by Stan. It was great shot by Stan. We have to do a better job in the second game of not coming out slow. We came out sluggish. We weren't playing good defense. We weren't playing good offense. And we can't do that and win when we go to Bayern."

CUNNINGHAM, JARED

FC Bayern Munich

"We were just too slow after the break. So we gave up the momentum. Then they had the crowd behind them and, in the end, could use the home-court advantage. Now we'll recover for a day and then we'll do our best to get our performance right through 40 minutes."